


Knight & Prince

by bell (bellaboo), bellaboo, usomitai (bellaboo)



Category: Princess Tutu
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-02-02
Updated: 2004-02-02
Packaged: 2017-10-02 02:30:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1697
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellaboo/pseuds/bell, https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellaboo/pseuds/bellaboo, https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellaboo/pseuds/usomitai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In isolating himself in his relentless drive to save Mytho from the Raven King, Fakir becomes vulnerable. Dark.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Knight & Prince

**Author's Note:**

> I started to write this approximately after having watched around episode... 19? (when Fakir fights the Ghost-Knight), and finished more recently because the story wouldn't leave me alone. Had to finish and bury it.

Once upon a time there was a knight with a king to serve. He was sworn with sacred words to protect his king from all harm, yet even without these lawful vows the knight was bound heart and soul to him, for they were the best of friends. It was with great happiness years later that the castle, and the knight especially, welcomed the queen that came to marry the king. She was a beautiful woman, full of charm and wisdom. There was none who did not love her. The knight, king, and queen became inseparable, and the knight was so very proud to be the one protecting them both.

Then, one day, the king and queen had a disagreement. This was no petty squabble over coming home too late or too much salt being poured into the food; it was political. The queen returned to her homeland to send her troops to fight the king. In defense and offense the king dispatched his own armies.

Caught in between, the knight had to pick a side but he did not know how.

For he did not know which one he loved more.

\---

It became an obsession of sorts. Fakir would borrow piles of books as heavy as he could carry, trudge with them over to his room, and there he read until he either finished the whole lot or fell into deep slumber from exhaustion. Days passed in which he forgot to go to classes or eat. He went through hundreds, thousands, millions of words, yet not a single one brought him a step closer to bringing back the old Mytho.

Fakir hated the raven side of Mytho, hated it because it was the exact opposite of the person he had treasured all these years. He wished he could just grab Mytho by the shoulders and shake the living daylights out of him, shake that dark shadow killing his soul, shake the old Mytho back into being. If he were Ahiru, maybe, he'd try pleading (the pacifist version), but he knew better. Words, no matter how vigorously said, would never dislodge the raven blood.

He didn't want much to think about touching Mytho anyway.

The only other solution Fakir could think to do was to break Mytho's heart all over again, but that sword had been broken by he himself. Well, there was one other idea, one that involved going and killing the big raven himself and hoping for the best. But to fight the big raven, Mytho, a murder of crows, *and* Kraehe? He wouldn't allow himself to even consider it. It wasn't the suicidal aspect that he minded. It was the futility.

Maybe Tutu was going about it the right way after all. If twirling around-- effectively-- in a white getup and sweet-talking the raven prince could be called a 'way.' He wished he could stop her from rushing so impulsively into those fights. By now he realized that no power in this town would stop her, but at the very least she could wait until he could be there with her. Not that he was ever of much use. How could a pearl-white fan trimmed with fluff be a better defense than a trained knight? It shamed and scared him. Shame for failing at his given role in life and scared him because it made her that much more vulnerable. Not for the first time Fakir cursed Mytho, and then bit his tongue.

"Is your nose still stuck in a book?" Fakir was so startled that he shook. There, perched on the window, sat Mytho. He must have flown in with ravenly help. At least he had the decency to come in the more mundane school uniform instead of that ghastly black-feathered leotard. He'd be a laughing-stock if it weren't so tragic. "Look at you, pale as a dove! I think you've been locked up in here for too long, old friend."

Ever since the prince had turned into a raven, Fakir had little patience for Mytho. "Got tired of falling out of windows?"

Fakir hated to classify it as such, but Mytho distinctly... giggled. Being a raven was doing him no good. "That's rich, Fakir! When did you develop a sense of humor?" He wished the raven wouldn't say his name. It felt so wrong and dirty when he did, like a prized memory warping in the face of truth.

"If you're here just to taunt me, leave."

Of course Mytho paid him no heed. He jumped off the window sill into the room and strolled around. "Some things never change, I guess. Like your bossiness and your book-fetish. And some things-- like me!--do." Almost as if he cared, he rummaged through the piles of books. "What's this?"

"Don't touch those!"

" 'A Modern Mythological Interpretation of the Prince and the Raven'? 'The Oxford Raven Encyclopedia'? 'Bipolarism for Dummies'? So funny! As if any of these will do you any good." With great satisfaction Mytho pushed one of the piles over, the books toppling into a mess.

"Stop that!" He barked out the orders and immediately wished he hadn‘t. It was a habit to be controlling, but recent experience had shown how well Mytho took orders now.

Laughing crisply, the sound of ripping paper, Mytho leaned towards him. "Awww, is the poor knight upset because he can't boss around his prince anymore? Go on, tell me to stay all locked up in my bedroom-- I dare you to!"

This had gone too far. Who could reason with an insane raven prince? Fakir turned his back on Mytho indignantly but he grabbed Fakir's arm before he could take a single step. With a slight leer, Mytho leaned in to speak into Fakir's ear. Goosebumps ran up Fakir's skin. "Go ahead, tell me." He came closer still. "I might even obey."

Words failed Fakir. He could feel each and every one of Mytho's fingers on his arm, the grasp tightening. Something in his head was pounding, like when he got caught up in a dance, like the hammering on a wall. It got louder when Mytho touched his face with one hand. "Come on," he whispered, "you know you want to... tell me you belong to me alone."

Within seconds Mytho was on the floor with all the books, letting out a small exclamation of pain. Fakir had done many things to Mytho before, including almost cutting a hole into his chest, but never before had he pushed him. Fakir was livid. "'I belong to you alone'? Are you trying to use me as bait for the Great Raven?!"

Mytho raised himself with the dignity of a cat who had tried yet failed to jump onto a high platform. "Maybe. But that doesn't matter anymore." He glared at Fakir. "You'd have been a bitter meal anyway. We don't need your kind." Mytho went to the window.

"Wait, Mytho! Come back here--!"

It was too late. The ravens had already taken Mytho away.

Fakir ran a hand through his hair, sighing. He needed to get out. Desperately. All those books, filled with word after word, were slowly driving him insane. The more he read, the less he understood. It hurt too much to look at them after Mytho had so openly mocked his efforts.

And he didn’t feel like cleaning up the black feathers quite yet.

\---

Sunlight, Fakir was surprised to realize, had become a foreign substance. His room's window was fairly small (though apparently just about the right size to let in deranged raven princes-- oh, joy) and faced such a tall building that little light came through. Today was the first time in uncounted days that he'd enjoyed sunlight. He'd forgotten just how warm it was. Comforting, even. This walk hadn't been a bad idea. Perhaps airing all those words, ideas, and resentments would clear his brain enough for the good, brainy concepts to make their way into his head.

But Fakir knew better to ask for peace and quiet on his stroll. Already he could see a tuft of orange hair peeking out from one of the bushes. For a single moment he debated whether he should or shouldn't-- was he in the mood for such insanity?-- before he tugged on the hair. Ahiru came sprawling out. "Ouch!"

She was the craziest girl in the world. She really was.

"Just what are you doing hiding in the bushes? Some weird instinctual duck thing?"

"It had nothing to do with ducks! I'm hiding from Pique and Lilie. If they find me they'll--" If violets were blue, then Ahiru's face was rose-red.

"They'll?"

"--They'll force me into doing things," she concluded.

Sounded like Girl Stuff. Fakir knew better than to meddle in Girl Stuff. Because walking into the traps females set down for you, as Fakir had bitterly experienced, led to accidentally standing beneath mistletoes or being stuck into tight, dark closets with a blushing member of the opposite sex-- or two. Yes, when it came to Girl Stuff, Fakir was always at least fifty feet away and armed with a scowl.

Yet curiosity will always win over experience. "Um...?"

"What? Why are you looking at me like that? Is there something stuck to my nose?"

"Not quite." He coughed, wondering how to best express the thought running through his mind. "Isn't 'Kick Me' the traditional sign?"

"Nooooo!" Ahiru desperately and ineffectively tried to grab the sign off her back, ranting at how she thought it was suspicious that she had seen neither Pique NOR Lilie for the past fifteen minutes so when they did get the chance to pin it on her maybe it was when she'd been by the tree or was it getting a drink of water at the fountain? Oh, and the sign had absolutely nothing to do with him, her friends were simply insane, that's it, that's all, so it be for the best for him forget it--

There was no way Fakir would ever forget it, but he did pull the 'Ravish Me' sign off her back and tore it to shreds. Girl Stuff seemed to only get worse as the years went by. Luckily he wasn't all that prone to blushing. Not immediately, anyway. He could have a delayed-reaction blush later in the privacy of his own bedroom. "There. Happy?"

"T, thanks! I just hope they're not watching, they'll just try again... Hey! Fakir, where have you been? Everyone in class said you were going mad bonkers and laughing maniacally in your bedroom and Neko-sensei nearly declared that you'd have to marry him as a punishment but then he stopped mid-sentence and started to scratch his head, it looked really painful, and, and--"

She hit 30 words a second. Fakir knew because he counted.

"And Mytho didn't come either. Have you seen him? Were you together?" The question stopped Fakir's heart, but Ahiru's gaze was innocent. She wasn't accusing or implying anything. He needn't feel so guilty.

But he did. "No, we weren't. Haven't seen him since he tried to take Freiya's heart." Ahiru squinted at him, one eyebrow twitching. "What?"

"You're lying."

"What--?!" Fakir had always prided himself on his poker face, he depended on being able to hide his emotions from the world. Since when could Ahiru read him?

"Remember how you lied to me about not knowing what was wrong with Mytho? You did this mini-twitch thing with your eyes-- and you just did that. It's okay, you can tell me, you don't need to lie, I won‘t get upset."

Tell her how black Mytho's humor had turned? How he had become so desperate for raven chow that he tried to lure in his best friend? The truth was too ugly, he didn't want to bring another hard hit to her hope. Because if Ahiru didn't have hope, who would? Who would give him that jump-start, the small flash of color in his life, when he needed it?

Worse, he couldn't bear to tell her how close he had been to giving himself away.

"I didn't see him," he said firmly, "Nothing happened. I mean it. Nothing happened."

Ahiru raised both her eyebrows. "Fakir--"

He couldn't tell her. It was too private.

"What do you know, duck brain?"

"WHAT?"

"You heard me. Duck brain. Did you know that duck brains are about the size of an apple? That's almost bite-size."

"QU--" She clamped her hand over her mouth just in time. "My brain is NOT bite-size!"

"You sure act like it. I'm amazed the crows haven't killed you yet."

"What about you?! The only reason the crows didn't kill YOU is because Edel--" She clamped her mouth as though to hide the worst of the words, but it was too late; they’d already been said. Words, even if the speaker did not mean them, can stake a heart more painfully than a sword.

Fakir tried to hide the shaking of his hands, of his voice. "Well. If I'm so weak, then you don't need me."

“Fakir, I didn’t mean--”

“Bird-brain. You don‘t need me.”

"Well, fine, I DON’T!"

"Good.”

They turned their backs towards each other and went off in opposite directions.

\---

Fuming, his feeling not unhurt, Fakir stormed to the library, took out another tower's worth of books, and stomped back home. He had already borrowed all the relevant books, and then some, at least four times already but he had nothing else to go on so he took them out for a fifth try. For the next few days he made his previous diet seem gluttonous. He only ate when Charon shoved food in his direction, and even then he paused only long enough for a bite or two. His neck hurt from craning to look down at the pages, his back hurt from sitting up for so long. Yet he kept on reading. There was no time to indulge pain. Especially not if Ahiru had left him behind.

Notes, some shred into flakes and some in bunches of twenty pages, were scattered all over the room with neither rhyme nor reason together with the raven feathers he had never gotten around to clearing away. He simply did not have the time.

There had to be something in these books, somewhere... When was the last time he slept? Around eight cups of coffee ago. Or was it nine? What did he care, he had more important things to concentrate on. On and on he flipped page after page. An answer might lie in the next paragraph or in the one after that. He was a Knight. He had to persevere. To protect his Prince. And to keep the princess safe, even if she was a bird-brained nitwit.

That night Fakir had another visitor. Or, to be more precise, the same person came a second time.

Fakir, getting up, rubbed his temples. "I thought I wasn't good enough for your kind."

"So did I. I hadn't realized how desperate the old raven is." So flippant, such a smirk. Mytho obviously didn't care even for his current head-honcho. Was this really the same human being that ran into a burning house to save a bird? Was this the same Mytho he'd grown up with? It couldn't be. There'd never been this trace of malice in him before. Had the poison replaced all of his old blood? It felt like everything Mytho ever once was had been destroyed by the black feathers. All his fears, all his worries, all his insecurities suddenly crushed Fakir. "Is there really nothing left of you, Mytho?" How Tutu-esque a question that was. But he couldn’t help it. He needed some kind of assurance, some hope to gnaw on.

"Nothing," his eyes narrowed. "Nothing at all. Except for this body, of course. Your prince is dead."

Dead. Dead. Dead.

Fakir sank down to his knees, bent over, clutched his head between his arms.

It had to be a raven's lie, of course. You can't trust anything a raven says, the books said so. But what if...? Fakir's heart contracted in a painful clench of fear. If Mytho, as he had known him, were truly gone, what then? What would he, the knight, do? Whoever heard of a knight without a prince, anyway? A knight should die before his prince does, even if only by a milli-second.

He wished he himself were dead.

Fakir knew Mytho was only preying on his weakness when he knelt next to him, that it wasn't love that made him hug him. But at this point he didn't care. His prince's soul was dead. Fakir melted willingly into Mytho's arms. He was tired of fighting.

Maybe it was Mytho who kissed Fakir first, or Fakir Mytho, but whomever it was, the other quickly followed suit. Quick kisses, kisses that lasted as long as ice cubes in the desert, frenzied caresses as desperate as someone pushed off the plank. All Fakir could hear was Mytho's heavy breathing and his heart pulsating blood; it drove him crazier still. When did he end up on top, holding Mytho's hands over his head? Mytho's shirt was mostly off, his body sweaty, his hair a mess.

What a lovely, lovely sight.

Fakir forgot himself.

Cradling Mytho tightly into his arms, he kissed him repeatedly, frantically. "I love you," running a hand through the gray-white hair, "don't leave me again," cupping his face. "I love you, I love you, don't leave me, oh please don't leave me, not again--" He couldn't stop.

Mytho took in the words and caresses in for a while before firmly grasping Fakir's chin, looking him straight into the eye, and kissing him long and hard. Fakir's frantic energy evaporated. "Of course I won't leave you," Mytho crooned. "I wouldn't dream of it. We'll always be together, I promise." With a sigh of relief, Fakir went on to kiss Mytho's cheek, his ear, his neck. "Will you love me, Fakir?"

"I do." Mytho was on his back again, Fakir on top.

"Always?" Fakir struggled with buttons.

"And longer." Now completely naked, Fakir touched Mytho slowly, carefully.

"Say that you love me."

"I love you, I love you, I love you--" He encouraged Mytho's legs open.

"Will you love nobody but me?"

Fakir nodded. With a near-sob of crazed lust, the knight began to ride his prince.

"Say it! Will you love nobody but me?"

Fakir, buckling back and forth, tried. "I, I--!"

"Say it, Fakir, say it!" Mytho pulled in Fakir's head to his chest. "Tell me you love me, tell me!"

It got harder to speak. "I, I-- love...."

Through the haze of desire Fakir saw a vision of pink and white, moving with more elegance than any living creature. He saw the clumsiest human alive, complete with orange freckles and bubbling energy. He saw yellow feathers and wide, wide blue eyes. He remembered this paradox of a being with all her smiles and tears. "Ahiru...!"

The spell was broken. With a mutual cry Fakir and Mytho separated, each clutching their own head, dealing with the emotions the name brought them. Mytho struggled temporarily with his identity but quickly mastered himself-- his original personality was too beaten to put up a good fight.

Fakir fairly much wanted to die.

"I can't believe-- I couldn't have been in my right mind-- I-- I didn't--"

Mytho watched him dispassionately. "Well. That didn't work." Quickly he re-clothed himself.

Embarrassment became anger. "You were trying to get my heart-- what did you do to me?"

"Nothing," he sneered, "Nothing at all. I only gave you what you wanted."

If Mytho were still there Fakir would have killed him, he would have throttled him with his own two hands, he would have stabbed his body afterwards a dozen times with a sword. And then burn the body into ashes. Yet Mytho was gone already, leaving Fakir with nothing but a roomful of black feathers and dusty books.

It really was time for him to start cleaning up.

\---

Rue had been waiting hours now for Mytho's-- and the heart's-- return. Feather-light steps brought her to his side when he appeared. "Well? How did it go?" Her face's excited flush drained at the sight of Mytho's empty hands. "What happened? I was so sure Fakir would be a shoe-in..." Biting on her thumb nail, deep in thought, she turned her back to him. She couldn't bear to meet his gaze right now. She hated lectures. She hated being wrong.

"It's like I told you--" From behind Mytho's arms wrapped themselves around her body; she tried to ignore what would come next. But she could not help but hear the whispered words. "--You can't take a heart that's already in love."

End


End file.
